NJEA launches ad campaign against PARCC, Common Core

Advocates and opponents of standardized testing are waging a full-fledged advertising war for the minds of New Jersey parents.

This week the New Jersey Education Association released four 30-second videos criticizing standardized tests for shaping school curriculum, stressing students, and leading to program cuts in New Jersey schools.

The campaign will run on network television in New York and Philadelphia and on cable networks in New Jersey, according to NJEA spokesman Steve Wollmer. Wollmer declined to disclose how much the union would spend on the campaign, but said it would be paid through member dues in a program called "Pride in Education."

The videos were released just two weeks before New Jersey students begin taking the state's newest standardized test, the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, or PARCC.

In the videos, parents talk about first-graders crying from stress, tell stories of social studies and science classes cut to make time for test preparation, and the new "crisis" of standardized tests.

"Parents are fed up, and they're ready to speak up," NJEA President Wendell Steinhauer said in a statement that accompanied the videos' release. "This ad campaign gives parents and teachers a voice in a debate that's been dominated for too long by people with no connection to what's really happening in classrooms today."

The videos were filmed from NJEA focus groups who gathered last fall.

"We brought parents and teachers together for two full days of discussion," Steinhauer said in the statement. "These ads give a glimpse into their concerns with what high-stakes standardized testing is doing to our children, their education, and the very future of public education."

Jacob Hartmann, a 15-year-old freshman at Toms River High School South, said he was supposed to attend the focus groups to talk about the impact standardized testing was having on his classmates, but he was ill on the day the ads were filmed.

Hartmann said his classmates were pulled out of their first period classes last week to practice for the PARCC, which begins in March for New Jersey students in grades 3 through 11 this year. His algebra teacher is also handing out homework assignments modeled after test questions, he said.

"We're coming into the final stretch," he said. "Tensions are a bit high."

The NJEA ads are in stark contrast to videos by JerseyCAN, a group that supports the PARCC and the set of standards it seeks to measure — the Common Core State Standards. The JerseyCAN videos explain Common Core's mission to better prepare students for college-level work and jobs.

JerseyCAN Executive Director Janellen Duffy did not immediately return a call for comment from the Asbury Park Press, but in a blog post last week she made a case in support of PARCC and the Common Core.

"While change is hard, we also recognize that the PARCC test is a better test that will provide students, parents, and teachers with a more accurate understanding of students' skills," Duffy wrote. "We will need all hands on deck to help make this transition to the new tests as successful as possible. Things are changing by the moment, but with continued support, we know NJ students and families will rise to the occasion!"